


There Isn't Another Way

by GrumpyJenn



Category: Doctor Who, Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: AU as of Time of the Doctor, Library Fix-It, Regeneration
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-12-02
Updated: 2013-12-02
Packaged: 2018-01-03 05:42:16
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 953
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1066494
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GrumpyJenn/pseuds/GrumpyJenn





	There Isn't Another Way

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Kehwie](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kehwie/gifts), [Kerjen](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kerjen/gifts).



“Are you certain you want to keep the big head?”

The Doctor sighed. “Yes, Strax, I want to keep the big he… hair. I love her hair.”

“It does seem to be a separate entity, sir,” said the Sontaran, as doubtfully as a Sontaran could manage. “Are you absolutely sure?”

“ _Yes_ , Strax!” The Doctor shoved hands through his hair and scratched at the back of his neck.

 _But it’s the only way,_ he thought. _The only way to bring her back._

The Doctor ticked off the tasks in his head.

 _Bully Strax into agreeing to make a clone._ Tick.

 _Find a large enough sample of River’s DNA from just before Darillium, when it was recent._ Tick. The TARDIS had had some of course; she loved River.

 _Supervise the cloning, along with the old girl_. He didn’t trust an unsupervised Strax - for obvious reasons - not to clone River’s body in Sontaran form. He shuddered at the thought and the Sontaran nurse looked up. “Are you chilled, sir? I can bring you a hot drink. Or we could defeat winter again! We can--” His volume was increasing as usual, but he broke off as the Doctor shook his head and managed a smile.

“Is she… it… she done?” he asked the Sontaran, and tuned out as Strax began explaining in bombastic tones how exactly he had cloned River Song.

 _And_ … the Doctor thought somewhat grimly, knowing what he had to do to accomplish this… _take her to the Library_.

Tick.

The old girl started up without his consciously prompting her, and Clara looked up from whatever she had been fiddling with. “You sure about this?”

“Why does everyone ask me that? You, Strax…” She was smirking at him, just as River’s ghost had in the months since she went to the Library, before Trenzalore.

“She’s going to be terribly angry with you, you know,” Clara remarked, and he was reminded anew how impossible she was. Not every human - not even every human he would choose as a travelling companion - would take this whole situation with such… equanimity. Especially as she was born to save him; it probably felt horribly _wrong_ to her.

It felt wrong to _him_ , but he had to do it.

_There isn’t another way._

The TARDIS materialised and bonged her Bell once, then opened her doors. Strax edged toward them with uncharacteristic caution. “Strax,” the Doctor said as patiently as he could manage, “They can’t get you in here. She wouldn’t let them.”

“You can’t be sure,” Strax said. “An enemy too small to see is an enemy too small to hit.” He sounded like he was quoting some Sontaran credo or another, and the Doctor shrugged, picking up the limp clone and cradling it gently for a moment, then turning sideways to get through the doors.

He couldn’t help it; he shuddered again at the sight of the chair, the one where she had… but it was the only way. Depositing the clone of his wife on the chair, he carefully strapped her into it, attaching probes as gently as he could.

And waited.

He didn’t have to wait long before the lights started going out, and one of the Nodes activated.

“A promise is broken,” it said in a monotone, expressionless as they always were.

But it had River’s face.

“I need her back,” the Doctor said simply. “I have created another receptacle for her… and I want her back.” And he waited again while the Vashta Nerada processed this.

“There is no need for the file that was saved.” the Node said eventually. “But you broke the promise. What can you give in exchange?”

“I am a Time Lord,” the Doctor replied. “I can leave you this…” he gestured at his own lanky form. “And yet live to take that…” he took the clone’s hand, “Never to bother you again.”

 _For a cloud of invisible microscopic piranhas with a hive mind,_ he thought, _they certainly do take their time answering_. In fact, it took so long for them to answer that he jumped when the Node spoke again.

“Accepted.”

Then things began to happen very quickly, and the Doctor felt himself begin to regenerate.

 

\--/--

 

Eons later (as far as he could tell from his time sense, which was apparently on the blink), the Doctor woke in the medical bay of his own TARDIS.

His first thought, peering at his new self in the mirror that the old girl suspended above his prone position on the exam table, was _grey, not ginger,_ and he giggled a little. _Still not ginger. I wonder what River thinks of… River!_

The TARDIS sent him wordless reassurance, and he found the strength to sit up. Taking stock of his new self - still tall and thin, looking rather older, eyes a bluish-grey - he walked around the medical bay, only to look up in surprise when the door opened.

“I think this you can walk past a fez,” Clara remarked, and she sounded close to tears. The Doctor held out his arms and she flung herself at him. He found himself patting her back in a very avuncular way, and she sniffled and smiled up at him. “Ready to go see her?”

The Doctor choked up at this. _Impossible Clara,_ he thought fondly, _just that one little outburst and back to her usual saucy self._ She took his hand and tugged him gently toward the other door, the one leading to the other medical bay.

 _What if…_ the Doctor thought, not sure how he would end the thought, and then Clara opened the door.

“Hi honey,” he found himself saying hoarsely to the woman sitting up in bed and scribbling in a blue book. “I’m home.”

 

 


End file.
